Raftel
by Kanthia
Summary: He has been waiting his whole life for this, pushing and striving towards it. Many have gotten in his way and lived to regret it. So why does this victory hurt more than anything he's ever felt in his life? [complete]
1. Solitude

_There are some things that can be taken away and never given back.

* * *

_He is crying as he opens his eyes and consciousness enters his head.

The sun shone a little too brightly into his eyes, as he lay sprawled on a beach of black sand. The air was dry and salty as it passed over his parched lips. He was thirsty; he was hungry. That he knew. He was rather good at telling when he wanted food.

Something is missing.

He pushes himself onto his feet, sand working its way into his bare feet, scratching the thin skin between his toes. There he stands for moment after confused moment as the wind whispers to him a story with a happy ending, one that he cares not for.

The black sand beneath his feet, the cool peppermint air in his nostrils, the sky colored pink. The ocean, oh how blue it is, lapping at the night-colored shore the waves have raced to meet.

He does a double take. There is a trail of blood leading from the ocean to where his body lay sprawled until a moment ago. He looks down to his own body, half-shocked to see a gash across his stomach and chest from which bright red blood pours, frothing and bubbling on the black sand below.

He is not sure what to do for many long seconds before turning and heading up the beach to a large blue-tinged tree. Perhaps one of its abnormally large leaves could cover the wound, at least until it stops bleeding.

There was someone, a long time ago that suffered from a scar across his chest. For a painfully short moment there is a name that almost comes to the boy's lips, but the wind carries it away with the faintest scent of sake and sweat and blood, an oh so familiar but tormenting and unknown scent.

The leaves of the tree are too high for a boy his age to reach. He isn't sure how old he is, but concludes that he must be very young if he can't reach the leaves of a tree this height. And yet, at the same time, he _knew_ he could reach the leaves. Somewhere, at the back of his mind, he knew he could do it. Somehow he could do it, but it's not like anyone can stretch his or her body like rubber.

He gives up and picks an older, dead leaf off the ground. It crumbles between his clumsy hands, the onset of fatigue from the loss of blood. He tries again, this time with a leaf that look as though it fell recently. It bends well, so he takes off his red vest and wraps it around his torso. With his shirt in his hands and his wound covered, he is content to return to the black-sand beach he was standing on a moment ago.

This time, the rolling waves have a gift for him. He cannot tell what it is from the distance he is from it, so he strolls casually up the beach to the water's edge and picks it up, brushing the slime and algae off it to reveal…whatever it was underneath.

It was polished, smooth and white, but badly scratched. A piece of wood that had broken off from whatever it had been a part of, the size of his fist and as light as a piece of wood its size should be.

He turned it over. There was tiny writing in a fancy black script that read:  
_To find the All Blue._  
Underneath it, in a messy handwriting that could only belong to a child, half cut off where the wood had splintered:

_too beecom the pyrat k_-

He stares at the writing for what seems to be an eternity as the pits of hell open up in his stomach.  
Instinctively, his hand reaches up to his head and feels only grimy and sandy hair underneath.  
_No. It can't be._  
The rolling waves offer no pity for the child, vomiting and wailing for what once was and what will never again be.

* * *

_/kanthia writes-  
I am so very sorry. This is because so many fanfics either omit death or focus on the death of one single character. Please, when you review, don't just flame because you don't like what happened. That won't change anything._

_-kanthia/ _


	2. Bringing Back these Memories

_Chapter the First Bringing Back these Memories_

_  
"Oi. Nami. Are we there yet?"  
The twenty-year-old navigator sighed and bonked her captain on the head. Some people grew up as years passed; her captain would forever be a child. "Yes, Luffy, we are almost there. See that island on the horizon? That's Juvarra, the last island before Raftel." She sighed. "I wonder…what kind of things will be living there. It's almost impossible to get to Juvarra. I mean, look at us. It took us two years just to reach it."  
Sanji came up to the bow where the two of them were seated. "Does Nami-san not have a map of this island?"  
She shook her head. "Too few people have ever visited it and come back to civilization to talk about it. The only real map they ever have of this area is from the late Pirate King's cartographer, Annie Belluz, but that's kept under lock and key in the Grand Marine's headquarters."  
The cook grinned. "If it is Nami-san's dream to make a map of the entire world, then Sanji-kun will be right there with her." He put a glass full of sparkling blue liquid in front of her. "But for now, enjoy your midmorning snack."_  
"_Oi. When's lunch?" The captain had momentarily forgotten about Juvarra._  
"_Soon enough. Quit whining." Sanji spun around with a flounce and waltzed into the galley. _

_Having used up both Nami and Sanji for entertainment, Luffy reconsidered his options. Chopper never did anything interesting, being both a reindeer and a doctor. That left the swordsman and the liar.  
Usopp was at the bow doing whatever the hell he did most of the time. Which seemed to involve a lot of exploding things and fires. Although, his 'experimenting' did cause rather strange effects in battle. Which was a good thing._  
"_Oi, Usopp. Whatcha doing?"  
Usopp kept an eye on the frothing liquid contained only by a small beaker with a tightly sealed cork. It was dark red in color and did not look very inviting to drink, which Luffy had learned from countless burning throats and what Zoro liked to call 'passing gas'._  
"_Luffy, can you go bother Zoro or someone? I'm kinda busy right now."  
The captain pouted and stuck his tongue out, but said nothing._

_Zoro, oddly enough, wasn't sleeping despite the warm weather. He was training._  
"_Oi, Zoro. Watcha doing?" He was used to saying the same thing many times over._  
"_Training." Duh._  
"_Any reason why? You already beat up that Mihawk guy, right?"  
Zoro grunted, as if recalling a bad memory. Either that or he was reaching exhaustion. Luffy considered telling him that once upon a time he had struggled with that much weight in both his hands, and that even though Santoryu required three swords, they probably weren't that heavy. Zoro spoke up before his captain had the chance.  
"That-" he swung the weights to his left. "-doesn't mean-" he raised the weights in his hands above his head and crouched low to the ground. "-I have to stop training." A final swing and he was finished, lowering the weights to the ground and throwing off his shirt. "'Sides, you never know if there is anyone stronger than him out there. And considering how close we are to One Piece, I'd better not be any old weakling when you become the pirate king."  
_

_Luffy remembered a long time ago saying that anything else would make him look bad._

_

* * *

Late dinners, he mused, were better than early dinners. By the time the sound of clattering dishes on the wooden table hit his ears, he was hungry enough to eat whatever was placed in front of him and then some. _

"_Oi. Luffy."  
He stopped eating for half a second to determine the source of the voice. His cartographer was picking at her food, obviously perturbed. "It's an uphill journey from here, you know that? The last stretch of ocean between us and the One Piece has only been sailed through once before."_  
"_So?" Luffy resumed eating, glad that Nami hadn't chosen a topic that important. _

_She pushed herself up, slapping her palms facedown on the table. Her nakama turned towards her, some amused, some puzzled and in the cook's case with hearts in their eyes._  
"_Luffy. You realize that we all have a good chance of never making it to Raftel at all? The chances are…like…molecular."  
Luffy showed an unusual expression on his face, one of utter seriousness and complete confidence. "Nami…" and like the passing wind, his expression vanished and his grin was back. "When I set out three years ago and met Coby for the first time…" he paused, giving solace for the fallen Marine, "he told me the chances of me becoming the Pirate King were umpossible. And Sanji, he told me I couldn't do it. And that Crocodile guy, and that Doctorine woman, and the clown guy, and the smoke dude." He started to laugh. "Wouldn't it be funny if I did it anyways?"_

_His nakama finally understood why they were following such a child._

_

* * *

Juvarra was all it was made out to be. Nothing. No people, no animals, just the moon softly shining on the short, spiky brown-tinged grass; the trees covered in golden and red leaves blowing in the cool evening wind._  
"_An Autumn Island…" Chopper whispered as if it wasn't obvious, which to the captain it probably wasn't.  
Nami took control immediately, like she had been doing for the past years. "Sanji, scour the island for anything edible. Lord knows we'll need it." The cook jumped up and was about to run off to perform his duties when Nami spoke up. "And take Zoro with you. God knows he needs to stop training for even half a second." Sanji pouted but said nothing as he went back to the ship to get Zoro, a perilous task considering the man trained more than he slept now that Mihawk was beaten._  
"_Usopp, take Chopper and go look for fresh water." Usopp gave a groan of impertinence, causing a vein in Nami's forehead to pop. She was rather quick to rile, he noted. Perhaps it was nervousness, considering how close they were to the One Piece._

_That left the cartographer and her captain, hopping from foot to foot impatiently. She never knew what to do with him. "Uh…Luffy. I'm going off to map the island. Why don't you go…look for people? Explore the island? And, um, be back to the ship by daybreak, is that tolerable?"  
Another one of his devilish grins. "It's to-ler-a-ble!" With that new word in his vocabulary, he was off.  
For a split second, Nami wished she had asked him to come with her._

_The night went well. Only two hours later, they were all gathered around a quite large fire enjoying boiled Kuja fruit, because no-one really bothered to argue with the chef as to what to name the fruit that grew in abundance on the island. Usopp tried, but honestly, who would want to bite into a fresh and juicy Usopp-the-great fruit?_  
"_Oi."  
The Straw Hat Pirates turned towards their captain, the two hundred million beli man. Child. Same thing._  
"_What Nami said. About us not making it to Raftel."  
What a ragtag band of six. The hundred and fifty million beli swordsman, the seven million beli cartographer._  
"_You know, maybe we should make a record. Leave our mark."  
The sharpshooter was going up for a cool eight million, the doctor for six million. The cook was up for seventy-five million beli, only half of the swordsman's yet almost as dangerous as a Shichibukai. _

_It was a wonder the captain hadn't been conscripted to become a Shichibukai, but then again you have to be caught before they can force that kind of thing on you._

_

* * *

_

"_The head?"_  
"_Sure, why not. I mean, it probably the first thing anyone notices when they see the ship coming, huh?"_  
"…_They'd be running for their lives the moment they saw it. With Luffy sitting on it all the time, you know." The swordsman was starting to get a little angsty to get to sleep after a long night of collecting whatever the hell grew on the island. Kuja. That was it.  
Usopp appeared on deck with a black marker. "Found this in Nami's room."  
There was a long silence.  
"…Nami's room?" The doctor was a tad too loud and should have considered the cartographer in earshot._

_

* * *

The six of them gathered by the headpiece: The captain, the first mate, the cartographer, the liar (only slightly mangled, those legs of his could outrun even an extremely pissed woman), the chef and the doctor. Six of the most unlikely creatures to ever unite under one flag._

_And were they ever goddamn strong together._  
"_You know…" The swordsman was never one to instigate a conversation from scratch. "It was a long time since we last did something like this. Like, the last time we did it, remember?"  
There was a nod of approval from all of them except the tiny reindeer who couldn't remember anything about feet on a barrel in the pouring rain._  
"_The Log Pose is set. This is it, guys." _

_They pushed off._

* * *

"_Luffy should go last. Seeing how he's the captain and all."_  
"_Ai, ai. Who should go first, then?"_  
"_How about we go in reverse order? Y'know, from when we joined?"  
Nami grinned. "Perfect." She tossed the marker to Chopper, who stepped out from the tight ring of nakama to face the head of the Going Merry. Zoro placed his arms underneath the tiny reindeer's own arms and gently lifted him onto the polished white wood. _

_A snap disconnected the pen from its cap. His gaze turned towards the sleeping sea. He lowered the pen to the wood below him._

"_Everything that has happened was so wonderful and new to me. I never thought I'd ever find nakama so close to me, and have so many good memories."  
The pen squeaked as he wrote._  
"_My dream is to cure all the diseases known to men and animal alike."_

_

* * *

The pen changed hands as the cook stepped up._  
"_I thought I owed the shitty cook a lot when I left Baratie, but I guess I was wrong. I owe you guys even more."  
A pause for dramatic effect._  
"_A profound moment? When I first laid eyes on Nami-san."  
They could tell he was joking, but who really cared?_  
"_My dream is to find the All Blue." He penned it neatly onto the head of the Going Merry._

_

* * *

_

_Usopp was speechless for once as he stood, pen in hand._

"_All the time, I knew that one day I would go back to Kaya and tell her everything that happened. It's just that…from the beginning to the end there's just too much. Like when we were at Logue Town and I met Daddy the Father, I think that was the first time I realized that to be brave…you gotta do it yourself."_

_He laughed through his tears.  
"My dream is to become a brave warrior of the sea."_

_

* * *

Nami was uncharacteristically silent. _

"_I thought I would betray you and never come back."_

_There was a long silence._

"_But…there was something so…different about Luffy-kun that made me want to. Want to come back. When he stood upon the rubble of Arlong Park and screamed my name, I knew I had to turn my back on my past because Luffy would do the same for me.  
My dream is to map the entire world."_

_

* * *

_

_Luffy wasn't sure what Zoro would do. He'd already beat up the Mihawk guy. There wasn't anything else, was there?_

"_I…thought I was gonna die. I was tied down in the middle of a marine base with twenty, maybe thirty guns pointed at my head. There was a moment when I surrendered everything, all my dreams and goals. I was such a bastard back then, would you believe I closed my eyes so that I wouldn't see myself die?"_

_Nobody laughed. _

"_But…when I opened them, there was Luffy, that bastard, all arrogant and pompous, bullets flying all around him. He saved my life, and changed my life forever. Not tyring to be all cliché or anything, but it's true._

_You guys believe in fate? I do now. Think about it. If Luffy hadn't have showed up that day, I would've died. Then we'd never have showed up at that place where that goddamned clown Buggy was. We'd never get Nami, so we'd never get to Usopp's village, meaning Usopp would have died when Kuro attacked, right? And the bastard cook when Don Kreig came, Nami when she returned to Arlong, Chopper when Wapol returned. And Arabastra would've fallen to Crocodile. All of this shit would've happened if Luffy had never set sail in the first place."_

"_I kicked Crocodile's ass, right?" Luffy didn't quite get it. _

_Zoro ignored his captain. "We shook this whole goddamned world, so let's end it by grabbing the One Piece…" Tears began to roll down his cheeks. "And our names will be heard even in heaven.  
My dream is to remain the greatest swordsman in the world, until I meet Kuina as the first mate to the Pirate King."_

_

* * *

_

_The thing about captains was that they were awful people. They bullied you around, kicked you, threw you overboard if you weren't worth their time._

_Luffy was definitely not a captain._

"_A million years ago, people told me it was umpossible."  
His nakama loved him; that was for sure. How could they not? There was something so honourable, so lovable about him. The thing that made people want to be around him, to see past his apparent stupidity and lack of common sense and follow him to a dream that certainly was impossible unless Luffy was leading you to it._  
"_I kicked all of their asses, so I guess…"  
His nakama knew what was coming._  
"…_There's no-one left to tell me I can't. My dream is to become the Pirate King!"  
They cheered._

_

* * *

Zoro enjoyed late-night watches. The way the moon shone down on you, it didn't care whether you were a little bastard who kept losing, or a fully-grown bastard who didn't lose at all. _

_The crow's nest was rather comfy, the way Usopp had set it up with blankets and pillows. It was amazing he'd never fallen asleep in it, considering how comfortable it was. Whatever._

_He started to doze off when he suddenly became aware of his ear being tugged on. Hard._

"…_The hell?"_

_His captain was dangling off the edge of the nest, bouncing up and down with the effect of a rubber arm, supported only by Zoro's ear._  
"_I slipped. Owari."_  
"_S'okay." He was rather forgiving, considering the hour. "Why're you up so late?"  
Luffy pulled himself into the nest by Zoro's ear, granting a grunt of pain from his first mate and another apology from him. "I can't sleep. Tell me a story."  
Zoro groaned. "What the hell?"_  
"_Please? I asked Sanji to, but he called me 'Nami-san' and tried to bite my ear."  
The swordsman was cornered. "Alright. Just don't go asking this kind of thing ever again, they'll think the Pirate King is like…a kid."_  
"_Aw, they say that anyways." Luffy grinned and sat down, crossing his legs. _

_That was rather true. Zoro took in a breath. "Once upon a time…there was a kid."_  
"_What kind of kid?"_  
"_Don't interrupt the story," Zoro growled, "I'll get to that.  
Anyways, once upon a time there was a kid. Um, and he wanted to get this treasure at the bottom of the sea but the problem was he had eaten the Baka Baka no mi, which turned him into an idiot and meant he couldn't swim."_  
"_The mayor of my town told me I eated the Baka Baka no mi. Shanks said he wanted to kick his ass for saying that."_  
"_Be quiet. So this kid wanted the treasure so bad that one day he jumped into the sea for it, and then he drowned. But he didn't die because a mermaid brought him back to life and they lived happily ever after."_  
"_You mean like Arlong? He was ugly."_  
"_No, it was a pretty mermaid."_  
"_What did she look like?"  
He sighed, not meaning for his captain to be so interested. "Well…she had long black hair and really pale skin, 'cause she was under water all the time, and her tail had black scales."_  
"_Did she wear a shirt?"  
A rather odd question for Luffy to ask. "Um, no. Her hair fell over her…chest."_  
"_Oh. You mean her second butt on her chest? Like the one Nami has?"_  
"_Yeah, like what…THE HELL?" _

_Luffy grinned. "What, you didn't know? I think it's some kind of giant secret, you know, that girls have butts on their chests. Once when I was hanging around the tavern Shanks told me…"  
Zoro was staring off towards the black horizon, mouth hanging wide open._  
"_No time for that. Later." Zoro shook his head and jumped up, almost knocking his captain out of the nest. "Luffy. Go wake everyone up. Now."_  
"_What? Is there free food or some—"_  
"_GO."_

_ A/N - I am so so so sorry, I guess my drabble sense got the best of me. Just in case you're wondering because I'm an idiot and forgot, I probably don't own One Piece, but in some alternate dimension perhaps I do.  
_


	3. Can't Bring you Back

_Chapter the Second- Can't Bring You Back-_

He is dying.

Three days and nights, long cold hours sitting on the midnight shore looking out towards the cursed sea. And remembering. There is a point where he is not quite sure what is memory and what is wishful thinking, so he gives up thinking all together and just cries.

Sooner than later, he lacks the fluid necessary to create sorrow from his eyes, so he gives in to instinct and begins to search for water. He stumbles, willing footstep after painful footstep towards the mountain at the center of the island where the pink sky seems to circulate around, not knowing what he is doing, where is water will come from or how many ragged breaths he has left in his chest.

A puddle of stank water lying in an eroded rock is not enough to satisfy his appetite and leaves the strangest burning sensation in his stomach, but his mouth is numb and he cannot taste anything. Likewise, a couple of wild onions and carrots torn from the ground, seasoned with roots and dirt and mud. Disgusting but satiating.

Though it was nowhere near enough to satisfy his hunger, his small meal brought him to the surface. Tears begin to roll down his cheeks again as he curses his consciousness for the millionth time.

_I...  
I just want it back_

They were alive. They had to be. Somewhere, somewhere out there his nakama are searching for him, and it is only a matter of time before they find him.

They weren't dead.  
He has no memory of them dying.

Memory…  
His shaking hand finds its way up to what should be the rough-but-soft texture of plaited straw to fit his head. As if it is still there, as always. The part of him that never, ever got lost.  
His hair is knotted and filthy underneath the flat of his palm, and for the thousandth time he turns towards the sea with nothing to say.

_I'm sorry_  
_I promised  
I would give it back  
_  
_Shanks  
__  
You promised me you'd be there at the end_

_"YOU PROMISED ME!"_

* * *

_I am the flower  
You are the rain  
Stay there without me  
And I am in pain_

Caves were interesting places. The coolness of rock to his fingertips, the smell of damp earth. The roots hanging down from the ceiling above him, which he pauses and laments: they were nature's ultimate sorrow; representing foliage that cried out for water and never received it.

_Where_  
_ Where am I_

Thinking logically is not his biggest skill, but even he can put two and two together given some time.The last island he was at…?  
Arabastra?  
No.  
Skypiea?  
Nada.  
Juvarra?  
Probably.

…Wait.

"_That's Juvarra, the last island before Raftel."_

His tired feet, scraped and bleeding from the rough stony floor have carried him further than he thought into stank air and darkness.  
A glimmer brighter than a thousand suns floods his vision.

* * *

_  
Raftel?_

It makes so little sense and so much sense at the same time.

He is here.  
This is it.

He is pretty much the Pirate King.

…_Yeah right-_

The late Pirate King must have had a weighty battalion with all he had left before going to whatever Marine-induced death was waiting for him. The cave before him is not a cave; it is a dome—maybe two hundred feet around, fifty feet high and not a speck of the color of earth is visible.

It's all treasure. _Takara_. However you want to say it, it's all the same. The glint of gold blinds him for a moment as he enters this…dome from a small and rather dark cave path. So much, mountains of coinsanddaggersandjewels, and all of it worthless.

It is so unbelievably hard not to think of his navigator, and his mind betrays him. Such a vivid image of her screaming with joy forces his cook to enter uninvited into his mind, followed by the swordsman shouting and the liar lying and the reindeer laughing, in fact all of them laughing and sitting around a warm meal on a cold day and doing whatever nakama do when…  
No.Stop.  
He pounds his fist into his skull, a fruitless attempt to knock the memories out of his head. No luck.

So much treasure._  
No One Piece._  
The One Piece isn't there. Shouldn't he be looking for it? Shouldn't he be the Pirate King by now?  
_And then what?_  
What can he do with a treasure but no ship or nakama? He can't leave the island, can't sail away and sure as hell can't swim away.  
_What an idiot._  
All this time he'd been set straight for the One Piece, so sure that as soon as it was in his hands he's be the Pirate King. And yet, here he is. Treasure and nothing else, no One Piece, no nakama.

His stomach hurts from hunger.

Without much warning, his nose becomes sensitive to the scent of his surroundings, the tang of chrome and gold and who-knows-what-else. His mind wanders and plays him a moving picture of fragrance: The kitchen brings him the erotic and flirtatious blend of smoke and spice with the slightest hint of aftershave. He wanders into the galley; exotic perfumes laced with ink and yellowed paper. The open air of the deck cannot drown the heavy scent of lies and animal fur enjoying time together. And when the moon shines high, the familiar perfume of sake and sweat and blood as the arms that took down the Hawk in flight pull him in close and drive his nightmares away.

It is impossible to stop thinking about his nakama. He was so stupid.  
At least with his nakama he could be a pirate. The One Piece is right in front of him somewhere and there is nothing he could do.  
_Shit.  
Really messed up this time._  
It is so unfair.  
How could he have missed the fact that his nakama made him more of a Pirate King than a stupid piece of treasure ever would?_  
Always together, fighting and winning.  
Inseparable.  
Family.  
One piece of something bigger-  
_

___One Piece?_

He ignores the gashes on his face that scream from the agony of salt and angry tears running into them as a floodgate of mixed emotion opens up and his lungs scream to whatever gods have forsaken him.

_____My nakama_

_____ were my One Piece-_

_____

* * *

_

_____/ kanthia writes-  
you probably noticed by now how out of character I've portrayed Luffy. If you may, think back to happier times. Every time Luffy's nakama are endangered he switches faces to some sort of 'real' captain, anger spewing from the depths of his heart. If you think how serious he was then, it's almost hard to imagine the kind of effect it would have on him if suddenly all his nakama perished.../  
_


	4. The Silence of the Answer

_Chapter the Third- The Silence of the Answer-_

His stomach has always amazed anyone who could bear watching him eat. Perhaps it was genetic, his brother suffered from the same problem. He was never full; no matter how much he ate he was always hungry again soon after.

And he has the uncanny ability to throw up on an empty stomach, he notes.  
_There is nothing left I just want it back why did this happen to me_

He stumbles. His vision is giving out, and the whine of blood becomes a deafening drone in his ears. _I just want my nakama back where is the One Piece why did this happen to me_  
His body seizes control from his brain without much of a struggle. Flesh creates flesh as his arms reach upwards in the cavern of caverns.  
_Arms creating flesh are like meat. meatmeatmeatmeat why did this happen to me_  
His fingers find a ledge cut into the rock. He looks straight up, half-consciously following his arms until he finds the ledge, a small hole making its way straight up through the ceiling of the Pirate King's treasury, one hundred feet up.  
_If there was no gravity I could go up it because Nami said I would float and meat meat meat meat why did this happen to me_  
His arms whine, begging to return to their owner. He is not sure if he should let them, for they acted on their own accord and arms that act without the brain interfering are not very nice. After some meditation on the subject, he decides that he likes meat and that he'll let his arms back.

His arms, however, are bastards who do not want to quietly return home. Instead, they pull his body up into the upside-down cave, rocketing him upwards through a tunnel that could only be man-made or devil-made; whichever one came first.  
_Or maybe Pirate-King-made I like meat why did this happen to me_  
His knotted hair catches on the side of the tunnel. Memories of a snowy country and a sick navigator are forced out of his head and tumble, shattering like memories do onto the gold a hundred feet below. He waves to them, unaware that he needs at least one hand to keep him from falling a hundred feet to anyone else's death.  
_Death  
Death is near  
I can join them  
My nakama  
I like meat  
Why did this happen to me_  
He finally remembers that his hands need to keep him suspended, but his arms decide instead to let him fall as they shoot up into the tunnel, searching for the top of it and perhaps a way out of the God-forsaken treasury.

They find a ledge and ask politely for permission to rocket his body onto whatever waits at the top of the Devil-made tunnel at the top of a treasury at the edge of the world. He requests that his arms submit to him again, and they stubbornly agree for the time being.

_Gomu  
Gomu  
No  
Rocket_

He shoots up, spinning in the vortex of wind around him. The tunnel is long but his speed is good and gravity can go screw itself. He finally reaches the end of the tunnel as his head slams into hard rock and he hears the sound of bells ringing. He laughs and falls to a platform below.

He is high up in the cave. The treasury was a hundred feet high and the tunnel at its ceiling was fifty feet long, so he is therefore a million feet up. That is pretty far, and Shanks once told him that if you went a million feet up you would hit your head on the sun. Peering up cautiously, Luffy convinces himself that the bedrock above his head will prevent his head from hitting the sun.  
_But  
If the roof is rock  
Then what is the light?_  
More treasure? No, treasure glints and stings your eyes. This light is soft and throws silver shadows on the walls of brown-toned bedrock, an unearthly glow.

He trips on a rock and falls to his feet, skidding foreword, tasting the sweet earth. His head bangs into something that is not stone. He groans, rubbing his head and faces a trunk.  
_A trunk_?  
A trunk of wood.  
_That's odd. Why would a tree grow in a cave?_  
There is a long pause as he slowly looks upwards into the branches of the tree, a cry building in his chest.

* * *

The tree.  
_The_ tree.  
It is old; its bark is gnarled and creased like the face of an old woman. Old but comforting, as he rubs his face against it to numb the shock and fear of finding himself in the shade of the Devil's Tree. 

Thirteen fruit sit in its branches at various stages of development. He knows this without counting; he had been told and retold that only thirteen grew at a time. The Devil's lucky number. He doesn't know what fruits they were; he had only seen one in his entire life, though he can guess that one of the less ripe ones was in fact his greatest asset and greatest curse, the Gomu Gomu no mi.

It is so real. Everything. The treasure and the cave and the hunger, he cannot wake up from this nightmare.

A fruit, ripe to the point unto which its branch could not support it, snaps off with a crack and falls onto his head. That is the last he feels of it; the Devil has taken it elsewhere for another victim to be cursed from his mighty seas.

He is starving and he is cursed. He makes up his mind without thinking much about the matter; reaching up into the branches with long arms for a fruit, any fruit, he doesn't care.

_Let's search   
For our dreams__  
And a-something something something_

He finds one, trying to push the memories of its bitterness and disgusting texture. He cannot afford to think of that as he conjures of the taste of meat and hopes it overpowers the taste of cursed fruit.

_Over the teeth  
And past the gums  
Look out, tummy  
Here it…_

_**Luffy/**_

Another voice in his head. Sighing, he discards the uneaten fruit and begins to follow it with a lack of anything better to do, without realizing he is walking straight into the strange and unearthly source of light.

Time fades away, but not from tiredness or hurt or hunger. Time fades away because, suddenly and without reason, time is irrelevant. Soon enough, hunger and pain are irrelevant as well and he walks with his grimy head tilted upwards. Further and further into the light until darkness is extraneous and all that exists is his tiny body and a wash of silver dye. And time passes for a long time.

* * *

His body and a wash of silver dye. Time goes on without him, but he is content to stay in the warm, murky air or whatever he is breathing. It has a strange chromatic taste, like the taste of black and white but not anything else. Out of the corner of his eye he observes a murky outline. A silver object in the silver light, what a silly thing. Unless, of course, the silver object is giving off the light which is currently suffocating him.

_**That is correct/**_

What a strange figment of the imagination. Objects cannot hear the thoughts of people._  
Unless…_  
One step and one more step and then a run and a leap and oh my freaking God it can't be.

_**Welcome home, Luffy/**_

One Piece.

* * *

_kanthia writes-  
kanthia is so very sorry for this chapter. when she originally started writing Rafteru, she had lost her computer and all her writing and art to a virus, and her boyfriend contacted pneumonia for a second time and was hospitalized. what kanthia is trying to say is that she somehow got over all of that but now finds herself having to write angst without being sad or angsty herself._

_durr._

_you may notice that kanthia's writing style seems almost childish in this chapter. that's because this fic is told from inside Luffy's head, ne?_


	5. Believing in Everything, Knowing Nothing

_/kanthia notes-  
This chapter contains a large amount of violence and character death. If you are squeemish or under the age of thirteen, take note and caution yourself.  
You have been warned.

* * *

Chapter the Fourth- Believing in Everything, Knowing Nothing at All_

It is kind of funny. He has always wanted it, yet never really thought about what it looked like. Some said gold, some diamonds. But what can gold or diamonds do that guarantee your position as the King of all Pirates?

He understands now, for this is the King of all Treasure.

It is difficult to tell what it looks like. The only things that remain constant are its silverfish tone and its spherical shape; otherwise it is constantly changing from shiny to dull, from solid to liquid, from floating to sitting impatiently on its pedestal.

It is an object animated. Somehow, he knows that it is waiting with irritation for him to come closer, to touch it. A sphere of pallid silver hanging in delicate balance, slipping in and out of reality.

He reaches out. Eternity sighs in response as his dirty fingers inch towards the object before him.

_Contact._

It is strangely soft and warm; as though, like him, it is blessed with life. Sensing his presence, the One Piece turns toward him (without truly turning at all) and smiles (without truly smiling at all) before speaking into his mind.

_**Monkey D. Luffy/**_

He shivers when it speaks. It is the voice he has heard his entire life, the voice that drew him to the sea in the first place. The voice of the One Piece in his head.

**_Why are you alive?- /_**  
_I'm not. I died.__**  
Don't be silly/**_  
_It's true. I'm dead and dreaming._  
_**You only dream when you're asleep/.**** You're very much awake, Luffy/**_

There is no use arguing with the One Piece. With his hand still on it, he sits down on the rocky floor and looks up, impatiently, waiting for an explanation. His mind reaches out to the One Piece once again.

_Tell me._  
_**Tell you what?- /**_  
_Tell me why you killed my nakama._  
_**My, you picked that up fast/**_  
_Picked what up? _  
_**Never mind/**_

It sighs and forces the images into Luffy's virgin mind.

* * *

It was a storm.  
It was a rather large storm.  
It was the largest storm he had ever seen. 

Nami was on deck with everyone else, yelling out orders to do this and tie down that and all that sort of whatnot. The cook was doing everything she said with vigour, the marksman's body getting in the way most of the time. The poor liar was driven speechless upon seeing their current predicament.

He ran a thick hand through his mossy locks, beads of sweat lacing through his fingers though the night was warm. He had never known fear quite like this for a long time running. It was quite simple, actually; they got through this, and they were at Raftel.

The sky was pitch-black without a single cloud to block out the swollen red orb of a moon, dripping and bleeding into the crimson stars. The water, too; the colour of night. The tiny caravel seemed so out of place in all the darkness and blood, and evidently the island agreed.

The entire horizon was covered in a tempest that reached up for miles into the sky: a wall of raging wind and storming hailstones of which no ship could pass through. He hoped to the Dear Lord watching over them that they were somehow special enough to get through, that their ship was small enough, that they would live, live, live on to touch land again.

It was a different feeling than the one he had when they had run into Hawk Eyes Mihawk only a few months ago. That feeling was of fear as well, but all of the sudden that fear seemed so small in comparison. Mihawk was a man; he was conquerable. This was raw nature in its most refined fury.

As they moved closer to the storm, they knew they had no chance. Nothing but a miracle would save them now; but God damn them if they weren't going to try anyways. It was a hell of warping winds and lightning tearing fissures in the tormented sky; all circling like mad dogs around what was undoubtedly Raftel in its eye.

The wind started to pick up. They had to yell to be heard above the coming storm.  
"You guys, if you have anything to say, say it now. Not all of us are going to get through this alive."

"I'm sorry I stole your Manjuu again, Usopp. I didn't mean to after what happened in Alabastra.""Don't worry about it. I never would have survived without you." The marksman was crying again. Fur and lies in an embrace of friendship.  
"Sanji, I'm so sorry for hitting you so many times."  
"It was of no matter, Nami-san. Your beauty was worth it."  
There was a tug on his sleeve. "Zoro?"  
He turned and looked into his captain's wide eyes, the breath forced out of him when he saw what rested there.  
His captain was scared. There was no doubt about that, the fear that had never shown up on his face finally choosing the perfect moment to come out. He could barely hear him over the rising wind.  
"Zoro…are you going to die?"  
He was silent, surprised at the person whose death Luffy dreaded the most.  
"Zoro…are my nakama going to die?" Large tears were gathering in his spacious eyes, threatening to loose their unrefined emotion to the world that had never known such emotion from the supposedly heartless Straw Hat captain.  
It was too late to turn back as he gathered the tiny body in his arms and pulled his captain tight to his chest, calling to his nakama to join him. They did so without a second thought, six bodies intertwined sharing tears while staring death in the face.

The first gale struck.

The main sail was torn off as the main mast snapped neatly in half; scattering the six in all directions. The mast came crashing down onto the deck of the caravel with a heavy thud, splintered wood flying in all directions. The cook took a sliver through the arm and fell to the wooden floorboards below him, a huge gaping hole replacing his left elbow, neatly soaking the vessel a startled crimson. The captain started rushed over to his side but instead got clipped by a larger sliver, nearly slashing his stomach open.

It started to rain.

Hailstones the size of the heads of men began to torment the battered ship. Holes and the subsequent appearance of water deemed the ship soon unable to float. The doctor and the marksman, with the cook thrown over his shoulder, ran belowdecks to try to fill in some of the worse holes knowing that it was an unbelievable futility.

Lighting danced in the anguished, unfeeling firmament.

Despite the pouring rain and hail, bolts of light that dared to come a little too close began their diminutive fires in the soaked, wooden vessel. Small fires quickly became larger and started their small war with the rain for supremacy. The navigator conducted electricity better than most would've thought and was struck hard and swiftly, knocking her over the side of the ship into the churning waters, blood seeping out of her head from impact.

A cry from a woman who had conquered the unconquerable, who had defeated the demons of her past, who lived on to pursue the dream she had forgotten for a long time running. A scream from a woman whose last map to complete a pictorial index of the world was hanging to dry in the galley. And then silence.

Thunder shook the caravel, shaking wooden planks apart into nothing but dead trees. It plunged deeper into the cold water, an injured boar fighting on to its death. The lower sections of the ship began spilling water into the upper sections.

A reindeer that had never needed nor been able to swim took his last sweet breath before submitting himself to the awaiting waters. His body washed out of the sinking ship and into the sea a million miles deep below. His cure for the cancerous cells that had plagued humanity for centuries was being verified five thousand kilometres away.

And the ship fought on to the growing shoreline in the distance.

The marksman's head met a hailstone of the same size. There was a moment of absolute nothing as his skull shattered, sending tiny shards of bone into his brain. He began laughing to tears as the pain melted away and the darkness became everything. Far away, a man with his likeness burst into tears, his red-haired captain wondering what was wrong but without the heart to ask.

He lied himself his last lie, that it was only a dream, and slipped into nothing.

Raftel grew in the distance. They were so close to safety, so close…

A wave of water so strong it was almost solid crashed into the Going Merry, splitting it neatly in half. The cook, already half-conscious from pain, was washed overboard for the second time in his life; there was no one to save him this time. Drawn to him by the scent of fresh blood, a shark from North Blue and a Bluefin from West Blue bumped noses with him before setting off in opposite directions. Nicotine-stained lungs fought for air that did not exist, finally surrendering and bequeathing his body to the All Blue.

The agonized Going Merry slipped silently into the black sea. Working on pure reflex after the shock of seeing his nakama die, the swordsman grabbed his captain by his soaked vest and began swimming for the coast. Tainted by the foul curse of Demon Fruit and soaked with blood, his captain was barely alive. He did the only thing he knew to keep his captain awake.

"Luffy?" He grunted, assaulted by waves and hail and who-knows-what.  
Luffy's eyes fluttered open. If he could take a full breath, he would have sighed from relief.  
"…Ai, Zo…ro?"  
"Are you…okay?" In his whole life, he had always trained the strength in his arms to defeat men. This time, he could not win. His strength was fading quickly.  
"Zoro…where are we?" Luffy had taken a hit to the head somewhere, amnesia already beginning its swift path of destruction inside his mind.

He wasn't going to make it.

He had to save his captain.

The shore was so close.

He leaned over so that his mouth almost touched his captain's."Luffy?"  
"Zoro?"  
"I'm not going to be there with you when you become the Pirate King." He wrapped his arms around Luffy's waist. "And I never thanked you for saving me from that Morgan bastard. So thanks."  
"No…problem."  
"Remember when I told you that if you ever got in the way of my dreams, I'd make you commit Hara-kiri?" A nod that couldn't have been a nod, it was so slight."I have one last thing to ask you."  
"A…ai, Zoro."

He drew back his captain, eyes trained on the growing shoreline.

"…_live_."

Luffy flew through the calming storm. Having given up his last ounce of strength to give him flight, Zoro slipped under the calming surface of the water. He had lost to the wind and the rain and the hail and the world. Everyone had lost.

Still sinking, he slid the Wadou out of its scabbard and kissed its blade. Only silent seconds separated him from her face. He blessed the life he was about to lose, blessed his luck, blessed his nakama, blessed his captain. He guided the Wadou up his stomach to the precise location of his slowed heart.

The Hawk's gravestone had his name engraved on it.

* * *

_**That is why, child, they call this island the Island of Broken Dreams/**_  
There is a tattered silence, as though the threads of sound have come undone and are lying at his feet.  
_I am going to kill you.  
**That's what Gol D. Roger said, child/**  
But aren't you his treasure?_  
The One Piece scoffed. **_His treasure lies below/. I have been here, nurturing the Tree of Demons since the beginning of time/_**  
_You still haven't told me why you killed my nakama._

A sigh. **_No-one can know of my existence, young Luffy/. My power is infinite, my possibilities limitless/. If I were to fall into the hands of man, there would surely be no hope for Mankind to be saved from his own greed/_**  
_So what will you do with me? Why did I survive and not my nakama?  
**Most men die within sight of Raftel/. You…were special, like your father/**_

_Father?_

_

* * *

_

_ /kanthia writes-  
if you are screaming/ scarred for life/ a dubbie, please do not come to kanthia's house with burning objects.  
raftel is most likely in its second-to-last chapter. there will probably be a sequel, though, if it ever gets written._

_this chapter is dedicated to Leon-kun. please, please, please get well soon. I can't live without you. _


	6. I Will Learn To Say Goodbye

_Chapter the Fifth- I Will Learn To Say Goodbye-_

_**And that is why, child, they call Raftel the Island of Broken Dreams/**  
They do?  
**They don't?- /**_  
Luffy's head hurts from wrapping it around the question. His mind was in the process of being poked and prodded by the One Piece, frantically searching his memories for something else to question him about.  
_So…  
What happens now?  
**I can give you two choices/. One, I send you on a raft to the nearest Marine ship/. You get captured, executed, everyone remembers you as the Pirate King and your name goes down in history/. You join your nakama/**  
Is that what Gold Roger did?  
**Yes, but would you call him by his real name?- /**  
What?  
**Gol D. Roger/**  
That's a weird name.  
**I chose the nickname, and isn't it wonderful for the King of Pirates?- /**  
What's the other choice?_  
The One Piece grins, being entertained for the first time in two decades. This child was like a miniature version of his father.  
_**I send you back in time, change one small event and you never meet your nakama/. You never make it to Raftel, and live out your life without remembering anything but that once upon a time you might have had other nakama/**_

There is a long silence as he tries to comprehend what never meeting his nakama will mean to him.It is inconceivable, for someone like him to understand what that entails. His heart understands, the pain of the feeling like there were others before in a different life. But his mind cannot.

_**Have you decided?- /**_  
He stalls for time.  
_Tell me about Gold Roger._  
It sighs. **_He was a man like you, only older/. It was my first time seeing a Human in hundreds of years/. Tell me, how old are you, child?- /_**  
_Nineteen. _The One Piece knew long before he answered but refused to believe his childish mind.  
_**But that would make you five years younger than the year in which Gol D. Roger was executed/. How could that be, unless you are not his child?- /

* * *

**_Logue Town. The hustle in the streets, the bustle in the alleyways.

A revolutionary that has shaken the World Government to its core slips the hood off his head and peers down at the smiling face in the Wanted poster he is holding. He grins, knowing that if he had not called to the lightning that forgotten day that boy would be dead by now.

Dragon cocks his head to the side.  
"_I wonder how my son is doing…"

* * *

_His hand still touching the ancient treasure, he waits patiently as the One Piece reaches out to the world around it for the man that has slipped through its fingers.  
_**Yes, Gol D. Roger is alive/**  
I don't get it. They killed him.  
**He had eaten an Akuma no mi/. It seems as though he defied me by keeping his life/**  
So he's alive?  
**Yes/. Undoubtedly/**  
I don't believe you.  
**Why not?- /**  
You killed my nakama._  
A strange sort of pain stings the inside of his head as the One Piece strikes him. **_Why won't you let it go? You were supposed to die with them/. It is your fault for living/_**

**_

* * *

_**But perhaps Gol D. Roger left a One Piece of his own. Two years, five years, does it make a difference to anyone? Not to a dead man, most certainly. Not to a dead man.

Children, treasure. There is no difference to the men that held them as they cried for the very first time. The former Pirate King laughs.

* * *

Portgas D. Ace pauses in the middle of his training regiment. He could have sworn he felt another voice laughing a porcelain laugh in his head, different and similar again.

* * *

_**You think all the weather in the Grand Line is natural?- / Do you, child, believe that the magnetic qualities of the islands, the Calm Belts, the Sea Kings- you must understand, child, I make them all/. I kill hundreds of pirates every day/. I must protect myself, and you understand?- /**  
No._  
There is a long pause; the One Piece has lost its words. **_What?- /_**  
_You are a coward.  
**I am an object, I cannot be cowardly/**  
So many people give up their lives to find you, and now you tell me that there is no Pirate King, and all those people- and Shanks- and everyone- _

He removes his hand from it and gives birth to a tiny, grimy fist. He brings it down on the One Piece, which responds with a rather stoic surface. The bones in the young captain's hands grind to powder from the force of the blow.  
_**You cannot destroy me, child/. Give up this Pirate King nonsense/**  
I- will- never- ever…_  
Clutching his limp hand, his mind is abruptly surrendered to the angered treasure.

_**Child, I am no longer entertained by you, and so I will give you both choices/. You will bother me no longer/**_

_**

* * *

**_Kuina's gravestone was cold and sodden that night. The students of the dojo, now famous for rearing such a legendary swordsman, swore they had seen her weeping for the man who had turned to piracy, whom she had loved so much. They put their swords down and turn to the heavy moon crying silver tears into the night sky.

Someone notes the second phantom, hazier and totally unexplainable to the human eye. There is only the green around his waist and the tanned arms around Kuina's neck as she cries, unintelligible clues to an inconceivable answer.

His ears pick up the gossip and rumour as he lights a candle in the memory of his daughter. He cries for the rest of the night.

* * *

The mikan shrivelled up and died that night. People whispered to one another that she was walking up and down the streets, red hair bouncing, smoke fuming from the edge of her mouth where a small fire burnt. The doors of her cottage creaked open and let fly a thousand tiny cranes made of old maps. 

Someone spits on Arlong's grave for taking eight years from her and only returning three. It was a strange vision; how could a nonentity produce saliva? Was it the spirit of the dead woman, or her daughter? True, they noted, the mikan could prophesy strange things and their deaths could not be a significance of goodness.

She tosses her periwinkle locks out of her eyes and screams to the sea for stealing her sister's life.

* * *

The town was strangely silent that night. Three years had passed, yet the stillness had never been this awful; as if he had always been there proclaiming the imminent danger arriving in the middle of the night. 

Someone turns and looks out the window, wondering why they had just heard a cry that pirates were heading in the direction of the town. Doors slam open, men brandish shovels and pots like the old times. They stare stupidly into nothing.

She is wailing to an empty tree branch, her illness returning with an emotion worse than anything she has ever felt.

* * *

The food turned sour in their mouths that night. It wasn't just the lack of the head chef who had retired early from his apparent age, but a strange emptiness that had taken the spirit from their hands and knives and dishes. 

Someone gets up and tries, once again in a futile manner, to scrub old bloodstains out of the tables that had been there from before he left. The dining hall is spotless as though no one had ever challenged the taste of food in the restaurant. Smoke travels up into the atmosphere.

He rubs the stump where a leg once was and contemplates on what he has just lost; worse than any appendage one could dream of.

* * *

The snow stopped falling and interrupted a storm in its fury that night. A man who had been ill got up out of bed to see the phenomenon with his own eyes and realized that he was completely healed. He brushed the fur off his chest. 

Someone rushes into town; breathless with the occurrence he has just seen with his very eyes. It brought up a strange conversation in one of the settlement's pubs: can a whole herd of reindeer suddenly develop allergies to snow, or are animals able to cry?

She has lost him for a second time; only this time there is no sakura to announce his departure. Her warm tears ruin the medication she is crafting.

* * *

He dyes his hair black that night. It seems the only fitting thing to do; even if it means losing his name as the pirate with red hair. The mirror gives him a strange image of a little boy with a straw hat many years older. 

The air smells of Pirate King.

* * *

_/kanthia writes-_

_yes, kanthia said raftel was ending. she lied, perhaps there was more to the story than she thought/_


	7. They Called it Paradise

_Chapter the Sixth- They called it Paradise- _

The world holds its breath as Logue Town meets its second King. They note his eyes; void of pupils and empty as though his mind was not his own. Someone murmurs to his neighbour as the gold-armoured Marines brandishing spears pass them by, pointing to the Seastone laced within the cuffs around the King's arms. Perhaps that was the source of his untimely pacifism.

People bow their heads from fear and reverence as he passes, some whispering the names of people who dared to oppose him, may they rest in peace. A woman with a lighter violet shade of hair pushes her way through the crowd and screams through angry tears at him for stealing her husband some two years ago. The people who know who the Don was hastily move away from her, knowing that any woman who married Don Krieg must have been insane for a large portion of her life. Three Mermen spit at him as he passes by; it burns on his cheek, but he does not feel it through the base pain of moving while held down by Seastone.

Lost in the crowd, unnoticed, a Shichibukai watches his brother proceed to his death. He cries warm tears for the first time in his life, hot and salty spots of wetness that could do nothing to counteract the consuming burning within him because of his strange Demon-given ability. His thirst has never and will never be satiated.

He could not have it end this way. Ignoring the mass of bodies around him, he raises one hand and opens his mouth.  
'Hik-'  
A tall woman with cascading locks the colour of cloudless sky and royal garb touches him lightly on the arm, startling him. They lock eyes and the princess of a desert country who has travelled so far to see her nakama die nods to him. It takes him a moment to realize who she is.

He is twenty-two, she is eighteen. Her head fits perfectly under his chin as they watch Luffy's procession with tears in their eyes. His arms work around her, under her arms; she notes scars that were not there before. There is not much that can make a man a Shichibukai; killing a man by the name of Blackbeard was one of them.

A scream surfaces as someone hits the ground in a cloud of dust. The procession of the Pirate King to his grave stops as five hundred thousand people simultaneously turn their heads to the source of the sound. An older Marine's eyes go wide and he falls to the ground in a faint as Dragon explodes into the crowd. There is no mistaking for who he is once he is disrobed with his famous grin lighting up his face; even those under the age of twenty-four recognize him.

The King is momentarily forgotten for the former King. Pandemonium breaks loose as some people move as far away as they can and others try to push in close. Shots are fired in the air and towards the now-aged Roger, whose body isn't keeping up with him as well as he would have liked it to. He knows his son is counting on him to get him out alive, despite whatever the cursed One Piece said to his head.

Holding her hand, Ace runs through the panicked crowd to get a glimpse of him just as someone brandishes a weapon with Seastone on its edge. The Marine screams for the memory of her old captain, a man killed by Monkey D. Luffy; with the Seastone guaranteeing her victory against Gold Roger, Tashigi plunges it straight through his chest.

Silence. The shocked populace watches Gold Roger cough crimson syrum onto the startled Marine captain. She twists the weapon around in a circle, placing a foot on Gold Roger's chest and pulling it out with a splash of blood on her face and clothes.

His body is thrown aside as the silent procession continues. There is only a stunned silence as people the world over gain a new fear of the Marines, the message of the old King's death and the new King's imminent death reaching out through Den Den like a web spun of horror.

Ace and Vivi push their way to the front as the men in gold lead Luffy up to the place where he was almost killed two years ago. To the horde, he is their King; to Ace, he is a brother that will never smile again. A desperate want, a desperate need to see him smile once more takes over his mind until there is nothing but the base desire. The Princess feels the exact same way. Tears run down her eyes as she watches the man who saved her country as he is placed on the edge of the platform exactly like his predecessor; the Marines begin the countdown that reverberates around the world.

The One Piece needs fresh blood. A man in the crowd suddenly finds his will not his own. He cries out to the King atop the platform.  
"Oi!"  
A startled mass turns towards him.  
"Did you see it? Did you see Gold Roger's treasure, the One Piece?"  
Like his father, Luffy smiles a grin that could not be bested the entire world over. Ace notes the sadness behind it but does not appreciate the fight his brother is putting up to resist the arcane treasure.  
"The One Piece?" Two hundred and fifty million people the world over listen closely as he laughs, tears rolling down his unusually wide eyes. "I searched my whole life for the One Piece and finally found it." The sound of the entire population of the Earth holding its breath at once became a deafening roar of silence.

"Go search for it. The One Piece is waiting for you."

Spears flash through the thick air.

The Second Pirate Age is born.

* * *

Contented by killing two birds with one stone, the One Piece decides against the equally entertaining murder of the new King's brother. It sits back and nods to the Tree of Demons, which rustles its leaves in the silverfish breeze from its sister treasure and returns to its perpetual task of sucking moisture from the ground.

The One Piece, however, is not finished. Its promise to grant the child both his choices, thus denying him a peaceful death, requires the extrapolation of timelines. A tedious task that would require some time; thankfully, this provides ample amusement. The last week has shown more than enough activity considering the pair of decades of ample boredom leading up to it.

Drawing out the threads of possibility, he notes where each thread of each of his nakama meets up with his and draws towards the centre, the birth of the King. It needs to create a line of time in which the King becomes the Pirate of the Straw Hat (denying people their basic desires was never a good thing, as it has discovered) but does not meet up with his nakama and therefore does not complete his course to Raftel, the Island of Broken Dreams. He never becomes the King.

Perhaps things would be different if the Merman had never invaded the young thief's island, meaning she would have no reason to betray her nakama and he would never get his first bounty. Only that would mean that the thief would have no reason to join up with him if she even was at the same island as him when he fought the strange man with a- oh lordy, lordy- rubber nose.

Even meeting up with one of his nakama is dangerous. Perhaps he could have Roronoa Zoro never jailed by the Marines. No, that would only increase the child's chances of meeting the swordsman.

Back further.

He played out the events leading up to the meeting between him and his first mate. The ship, the seafaring serpent to whom he delivered its rightful punishment for stealing the arm of a man who never deserved it. A whirlpool; this caused him to land on the ship of a woman pirate which led him to a young boy who showed him to the island in which Roronoa Zoro almost lost his life unjustly.

Ah, a whirlpool. Without which he would never have met the young child with periwinkle locks who showed him to the Marine base. And, without his beloved swordsman, would never have attempted to snatch a bird in flight and therefore would not meet up with his navigator. A perfect plan.

The One Piece drew out the lifeline and noticed a small problem concerning the death of his nakama. No, more deaths. There was a small desert country near Reverse Mountain (relatively, of course) in which two million lives depended on him saving its princess. Not that the One Piece truly cared, but perhaps some of them would be more entertaining in life then death.

* * *

And, it seemed, in death there were more truths than life. 

He had spent two long years looking for it, yet the whole time dreading its coming, for he would have to leave his nakama. Nakama were treasures more important than anything. Even the silver orb that laughed in his head was worthless to him.

Raftel, the Island of Broken Dreams. He had reached it, he had found the One Piece and he did not regret it but wished the journey could have been longer, for it was truly not the destination but the journey that he had enjoyed more.

There was no contest, no competition. The One Piece was a dream outside itself- the Pirate King was not a man who had an object, but a man who had nakama.

* * *

The sun sets on Raftel, tingeing the violet sky with crimson and silver streaks; as though the dying sun is bleeding its last onto its home, the heavens. A different sort of wind chortles through the aqua-coloured trees. The disturbed Kuja fruit rattle like men bound in chains, sending a cry for their ripe pods to be cracked open. Soon, the crisp smell of night whispers tiredly into the landscape; it murmurs over the now-still water, silent as a snowfall in the darkest of nights. 

The First Age has come and gone with the sound of books being closed and pens poised over fresh pages. Men and women connected to the six pirates that rattled the world to its core wipe their eyes dry and return to their respective lives.

Zoro's picture finds a way next to the girl who pushed him forewords, his gravestone marked with the names of swordsmen who thought they were better than him.

Nami's name is written on five thousand mikan, a job that takes the village the entire night. Someone raises a wooden cross next to her mother's.

Usopp's love, Kaya, returns to her bed as her two years of health wane like a drying well. She will not survive to see the sun rise again.

Sanji's father wonders why he never told him so; after all, dreams of the All Blue don't come from just anywhere. He hums an old lullaby about fish from four oceans that converge into one.

Chopper's herd climbs up to the peaks of the snowy mountains of Drum, the ailing doctor quickly accepting their company.

Time comes and goes, nodding its head and tipping its hat politely. They put his picture in their new but rather dusty tomes entitled "The Second Age of Pirates", ready to write about the next man to fall for the One Piece's song of greatness.

Life, death, the eternal struggle in between.

The One Piece waits for its next King.

* * *

_/kanthia writes-_

_the end.  
_


	8. Epilogue

_Epilogue- Just an Ordinary Boy_

Portgas D. Ace never returned to the sea.

He was a Shichibukai and the older brother of the King. He could have asked for anything and received it on a platter of silver studded with inset jewels, yet he had lost his appetite for both food and adventure after seeing the one child he loved die. He proposed to the Queen of Alabastra a week into the new Age.

They planned a small marriage in a country still picking up the rubble from its civil war. The populace seemed dead like its queen and her betrothed; they knew who had saved them, who had brought the happy couple together. And that child was newly deceased.

They were content together but spoke in strings of silence, comforted only by the entanglement of arms that linked them together. They would sit like thus for hours on end staring into the empty sea. Men whispered that they were waiting for the King to come home on his tiny vessel, shining golden in the dying sun.

Alabastra gained a new protector, a new Shichibukai whose strange power allowed him to stay under the hot sun without burning. Life went on. Time came and went and there were soon minutes on end when they forgot about him.

* * *

That was where she found him. On the same cliff, looking into the same sun with the same expressionless face; the memories hit him hardest at sunset. It was under the setting Alabastra sun that he had seen his brother for the last time before his death. 

Though his body was warm she sensed the coldness underneath, the shock and numbness. His weights lay casually tossed to one side. She knew he was constantly pushing his training past the point of safety in a futile attempt to block out the memories with pain. It never worked.

"Ace-kun?"

He turns to her; a half-hearted smile pasted on his face. "Stop calling me that. You don't have to."

"Ah…gomen. May I sit with you?"

"Certainly." She was reminded of the red-haired navigator who commented on how polite he was so many years ago. The tears she had been holding back came all at once; she collapsed to his side and buried her head in his naked chest, sobbing. He could do nothing but cry silently with her.

* * *

They called him Straw Hat Shanks for a while after that. He didn't like being famous just for giving an article of clothing away and never receiving it back, and soon his name returned to Red Hair Shanks like it had been before despite his newly dyed black tresses. 

It sounded bad. He secretly liked the former name; it reminded him of the tiny child with a bandage under his eye wailing as he sailed off.

He didn't smile as much as he had before, since hearing of Luffy's death. He had no more reason to. He had been waiting for so long to see the boy again, to hear of his adventures and meet his nakama and tell him he could keep the stupid hat. It had never meant much to him anyways.

There was a thin skin healed over the scars on his left eye. It hurt when he cried anyways.

* * *

The Marines praised him and gave him honours and made speeches about him and he wasn't listening. He refused to. It shouldn't have ended this way. He was too young, much too young to have to put up with this. 

They said he was a prodigy to capture the Pirate King at the tender age of sixteen. They didn't know half of it.

And how could he explain that he had been scouting the uninhabited island known as Juvarra, probably sent there on a suicide mission (the admiral had issues with sending him to his death multiple times in the past) when in the middle of the night whilst taking a stroll on the decks of his warship he had noticed the tiny piece of wood acting as a raft for the most dangerous pirate on the known planet?

Never mind that he was holding a strange treasure in his hand that was confirmed to be a fragment of the One Piece. Oh, that had changed things quite dramatically.

Helmeppo was still speaking as if he had been awake when the events had transpired. If only he had known how he had felt the moment he realized he realized who the boy on the raft was. But that was in the past and they were calling him to speak for the millions of Marines he couldn't care less about.

Sweat danced in his hair. He ran his delicate fingers through the pink locks, adjusted his glasses and stepped up to the podium. His speech was going to be heard throughout the world, better make it interesting.

He cleared his throat. There was a lump forming in it that confirmed he would not get through this presentation without embarrassing himself on a global scale in the form of salt water.  
"It started two years ago."  
He was celebrated throughout the globe for being the first and last man alive to see the King as a pirate.  
"I was just a child, by chance aboard the ship of a lady pirate…"

* * *

Such an ordinary boy. Born an ordinary birth without strange marks or strange prophecies or a strange upbringing. 

Was it fate?  
Was it destiny?  
Was it just luck?

It wasn't fair whichever way he looked at it. Right side and left side and upside-down side were all the same. Inside-out side showed some promise but returned nothing. He was dead, he died, they killed him. He was the King. He had accomplished his goal and lost everything in the process, leaving him only with the feeling that this was not the way things were supposed to turn out.

Just one more day in paradise, the journey and not the goal that was important. Before you got there and all of the sudden everyone is dead and off goes your head. All because of the stupid, stupid One Piece.

Oh, how ironic; reaching out for your whole life for something that wasn't even there.

Death, at least, was nice and dark. It was better than a lot of other things like living without nakama. He wondered if they were somewhere near him and started searching before he had made up his mind.

Unfortunately, the One Piece had made other plans.

* * *

_-end_

_/kanthia _


	9. Just a Little Bit After the End

/sainkuu for reading _Raftel_. It has been a long and difficult journey from start to finish to play out such strong emotions without sounding strange or emotionless.

Kanthia answers some reviews.

Shadw- Thank you…but what did you find so messed up about _Raftel_?

Griever5- Nee. Thank you for all your wonderful reviews- it makes Kanthia happy inside to see someone who takes his or her time to review more than once.

EH?- Um, thanks for the poem. Whee.

Beans- Nee, that is so nice to say…Kanthia has never written a 'must-read' before. And perhaps people don't review because they are afraid of what I will do to them…

OverChasm- Squee! Huggle! Huggles for OverChasm

imjuzakyd- Me so sorry for being confusing. What happens in Chapter the Seventh is quite simple: Luffy is about to be killed by the Marines and Ace and Vivi are watching from the crowd. Ace tries to use the Hiken but is stopped by Vivi as Dragon (Gold Roger) bursts into the throng. Still grieving over Smoker's death (Luffy killed him), Tashigi kills Dragon with Smoker's own weapon. On the execution platform, Luffy is about to be executed when the One Piece takes over the mind of a person in the crowd and causes him to ask about the One Piece, since the treasure thrives on fresh blood and is entertained by weak dreamers. The rest is left to History as the Second Age, in which Pirates have more faith in their nakama and care less about just gold, begins.

After that, it goes back to the One Piece. If you remember, the One Piece promised Luffy either to die as the Pirate King or go backing time and have one event changed so that he could never get to Raftel in the first place. It discovers that if Luffy had never sailed into a whirlpool so early on he never would have met up with Coby, never would have met up with Zoro, never would have made it to the island where Nami was trying to steal the map from Buggy and so on and so forth.

The rest of the chapter ties up lose endings. And then it ends and goes into the epilogue.

Insomnia's Phone Number- Thank you so much, I was always worried that I was portraying Luffy out of character.

meethzoonk- You're very welcome.

bffimagine – ZoLu? Sort of. I've always imagined Luffy putting just a little more trust in Zoro and visa versa because they were together first. And I wanted it to end with just the two of them as well.

KuroKame- Yes, after writing this I have wanted to set out for Raftel and put an axe through the One Piece. Although I'm not sure if that would work that well…

Ano...much more people with many wonderful reviews, but Kanthia must be on her way to the wonderful land of not here. Which means that _Raftel_'s sequel, _Once More from the Top_ is at least two months away. Gomen nasai!

/kanthia


End file.
